Resumo

TORO POSADA, Álvaro; SANIN ARANGO, Jaime Eduardo  e  URIBE RIOS, Alejandro. Retrograde flexible intramedullary nailing in femoral shaft fractures in children. Iatreia [online]. 2005, vol.18, n.2, pp.167-176. ISSN 0121-0793.

A descriptive, prospective, longitudinal study was carried out in Medellín, Colombia, in order to determine the clinical evolution of diaphyseal femoral fractures in children aged between 6 and 12 years using retrograde flexible intramedullary nailing. We followed up 70 fractures in 52 boys and 18 girls. The average follow-up period was 6 months (range 4 to 20 months). Average age of patients was 8.3 years. Duration of the surgical procedure averaged 52.6 minutes. Average in-hospital stay was 7.8 days. We did not have any cases of deep infection. There were 4 cases of superficial skin infection and 3 patients required reoperation due to protrusion of the medial nail under the skin. None of the patients had complications such as loss of range of motion, non-union, hardware failure, injury to the distal femoral physis or heterotopic ossification. In conclusion, we recommend this method as an excellent treatment modality for diaphyseal fractures of the femur in patients between 6 and 12 years of age.

Palavras-chave : children orthopaedics; flexible intramedullary nails; fractures of the femur; osteosynthesis.

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